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On CNBC’s Fast Money, Novogratz expressed his optimism towards both bitcoin and Ethereum in the mid-term. Novogratz, who has predicted the price of bitcoin to achieve the $10,000 mark before the end of 2017, stated that bitcoin price will quadruple by the end of 2018, and the price of Ether, the native cryptocurrency of Ethereum, will triple in value.

“Bitcoin could be at $40,000 at the end of 2018. It easily could. Ethereum, which I think just touched $500 or is getting close, could be triple where it is as well,” said Novogratz.

Why is Novogratz So Confident?

Earlier this year, Novogratz officially retired from the traditional finance industry to solely focus on cryptocurrency investments. Over the past few months, Novogratz has had conversed with many institutional investors, that are already preparing to engage in bitcoin trading by the end of this year, upon the launch of CME’s bitcoin futures exchange.

Novogratz noted that a big “wave of institutional investors” is coming to the bitcoin market across the world, with several major firms like $95 billion Man Group and Fidelity Investments, which manages over $3.2 trillion worth of assets, leading investors into the bitcoin market.

“There’s a big wave of money coming, not just here but all around the world. What’s different about these coins than other commodities … there is no supply response here. So it’s a speculator’s dream in that as buying happens there’s no new supply response that comes up. So every price move gets exaggerated. It’s going to get exaggerated on the way up. There will be 50 percent corrections. It will get exaggerated on the way down.”

Novogratz is not the only investor who has predicted large price corrections in the far future. This week, BitGo engineer Jameson Lopp stated that major corrections could occur throughout the process of bitcoin evolving into a trillion dollar market. But, Lopp emphasized that it is important acknowledge that even an extreme correction such as a 50 percent decline in price would only set back the bitcoin price by two months.

In bull markets like bitcoin, the vast majority of investors often fail to recognize strong rallies and massive gains in price, and fixate on the occasional declines in value.

Is $40,000 by 2018 Possible?

Year-to-date, in 2017 alone, the price of bitcoin has increased by nearly 11-fold, from around $900 to $9,700. In comparison to an 11x increase in value, a four-fold surge in price seems more realistic and likely.

In 2017, the bitcoin market has been led by general consumers and casual investors. Virtually no institutional money has been invested in bitcoin. By 2018, experts including Novogratz, Bitfury vice chairman George Kikvadze, and Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong expect tens of billions of dollars to be invested in bitcoin, pushing the market valuation to a trillion dollars.

“Crypto Space is at $300 billion. Already some Private Wealth Offices are positioning to cater to the newly minted cryptocurrency millionaires. Now that’s going to be interesting,” wrote Kikvadze.

Featured image from Shutterstock.

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